1. Field
The following description relates to an apparatus and a method for determining an immersion risk of a mobile terminal user.
2. Description of the Related Art
The number of users that enjoy a variety of contents or applications using mobile terminals, such as smartphones and tablet personal computers (PCs), has increased. Contents and applications for mobile terminals have diversified in quantity and in quality with the rapid development of software and hardware performance of the mobile terminals. Accordingly, users may easily become visually, aurally and tactually immersed in the mobile terminals.
However, when the users are immersed in the mobile terminals, it may cause many physical and mental problems. For example, compared to the case of normal users, when a child is immersed in mobile terminals for a long time, brain activity in the right side frontal lobe decreases, which may cause mental problems, such as attention deficit disorder. In addition, when a user is immersed in a mobile terminal with poor posture for a long time, the user may experience physical problems, such as scoliosis. In the case of adult users, immersing themselves in mobile terminals while on the move can lead to a variety of accidents due to carelessness during walking.
In this manner, with the development of mobile terminal technology and diversification of contents for mobile terminals, environments in which users can easily become immersed in the mobile terminals have been increasingly created. Therefore, there is a demand for technology in which a mobile terminal may intelligently determine whether a user is immersed in the mobile terminal so as to take steps to assure the safety of the user.